[You had no idea how long you had been unconscious.]
[When you woke again, the first thing you felt was not pain, but cold-a cold that seeped into the cracks between your bones, as though even your consciousness would freeze.]
[You opened your eyes. Your vision remained blurred for quite some time before slowly coming into focus.]
[This was a cave, damp, dark, and cramped. Droplets fell one by one from its walls, "drip, drip," drawing out long echoes in the deathly silence, as though something were repeatedly hammering at your nerves.]
[Your clothes were still wet, clinging tightly to your skin. You could not tell whether it was water from the waterfall or your own sweat.]
[You tried to move, and searing pain immediately surged through every limb and bone. Soul Power darted wildly through your meridians like a swarm of startled snakes.]
[You lay there for a long time. Once you had gathered enough strength, you finally gritted your teeth and propped yourself up. Bracing against the rough cave wall, you felt your way deeper into the cave, one step at a time.]
[The farther you went, the brighter the light gradually became. You looked up and saw an opening in the stone ceiling. Sunlight poured through it, illuminating the entire space.]
[It was a small stone chamber, roughly ten square meters.]
[Water occasionally seeped from cracks in the stone walls and trickled slowly down them, spreading into small patches of dampness on the stone floor.]
[The entire chamber was empty except for a small mound of earth piled on the ground directly beneath the opening.]
[The mound was small, about an arm's length across at its base, as though someone had piled it up handful by handful. The soil was loose and soft, darker than the surrounding dirt, and faintly exuded a gentle, warm aura that was utterly out of place in this cold, gloomy cave.]
[On the mound, a peculiar stalk of Blue Silver Grass with golden patterns on her leaves drooped listlessly.]
[You guessed her identity.]
[The Blue Silver Emperor-Ah Yin-your fated one.]
[You instinctively wanted to draw close to her. You did not know whether it was because of fate or your Martial Soul's bloodline.]
[You approached one step at a time. When you were just three steps away from her, the nearly depleted Soul Power within you suddenly began circulating on its own. Though slow, it was steady and continuous.]
[Your Martial Soul also quietly appeared in your palm.]
[You glanced down, suppressed the thoughts surging through your mind, and, rather than act immediately, sat down to meditate in the stone chamber.]
[The Soul Power within you gradually replenished.]
[You looked at that stalk of Blue Silver Grass again.]
[She swayed quietly. Sunlight spilled through the opening in the stone and shone on her golden patterns, making them look like sacred totems.]
[You took a small trowel from your Storage Soul Tool.]
[You carefully transplanted her from the mound into a pot of spirit soil you had prepared beforehand.]
[Her leaves were thin and withered. She looked even weaker than an ordinary stalk of Blue Silver Grass.]
[You took out the diluted Spirit Spring Water and slowly poured it into the spirit soil.]
[Her leaves unfurled a little.]
[You looked around and tapped the surrounding stone walls, but did not find the legendary Blue Silver Emperor Right Leg Bone.]
[You guessed that Tang Hao might have been carrying that Soul Bone with him.]
[You put Ah Yin into your Storage Soul Tool, took one last look at the stone chamber, and quietly left the cave without lingering.]
[You took a winding route, evaded every watching eye, and left Nuoding City.]
[You traveled south and entered the territory of the Star Luo Empire.]
[You stopped in a small town on the Star Luo Empire Border. It was a peaceful town whose inhabitants were mostly ordinary farmers and hunters. Soul Masters rarely appeared there.]
[You bought a secluded little courtyard at the easternmost edge of town and settled into seclusion.]
[Your backyard was planted with flowers and grass. In its center, you reserved a small patch with the best sunlight and transplanted Ah Yin there.]
[Your life on the run finally came to an end.]
[You began living a quiet, stable life, devoting yourself to cultivation each day and leisurely tending your grass.]
[You took some of the immortal herbs stored in your Storage Soul Tool, extracted their essence, diluted it into a liquid, and watered Ah Yin with it twice daily, morning and evening.]
[She recovered at a speed visible to the naked eye.]
[Her roots slowly spread through the spirit soil, taking an ever firmer hold. Her leaves gradually unfurled as well, changing from withered yellow back to emerald green, before fine strands of golden markings emerged amid that green.]
[Sometimes, while you watered her, two of her leaves would suddenly reach over quietly and gently wind around your fingertips in an affectionate gesture.]
[So light. So soft.]
[Like a newborn baby instinctively trying to grasp something warm.]
[You knew that Ah Yin had already recovered a tiny measure of subconscious awareness.]
[You did not pull your fingers away. You quietly felt the slight coolness coming from those two leaves.]
[A strange feeling suddenly arose in your heart.]
[It was as though what you were raising was not a stalk of grass.]
[But a tiny, fragile pet that needed someone to care for her.]
[At eleven years old, your accumulated Soul Power reached rank nineteen.]
[Continuing to cultivate yielded very little improvement.]
[You knew it was time to obtain a Soul Ring.]
[You made thorough preparations.]
[You drew a distribution map of every known Soul Beast in the nearby forest, marking their species, ages, and habits.]
[You devised several hunting plans, ranging from direct assaults to luring prey into traps, from fighting alone to making use of the terrain.]
[You ran through every plan countless times in your mind until you were certain nothing could go wrong.]
[You cleverly used the temperature difference between day and night to design an automatic watering device. Diluted Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well Spring Water was sealed inside copper pipes, which absorbed heat by day and released it at night, maintaining the soil's moisture without any effort on your part.]
[You prepared a week's worth of essence solution for her in seven Green Jade Bottles, arranged them by date, and tied thin hemp cords around their mouths so that a tug would tip them over.]
[You placed a ring of Insect-Repelling Stones around her soil, then checked the sunshade's sturdiness three times.]
[Ah Yin had thrived under your care and was already three feet tall.]
[On the evening before your departure, you watered her one last time.]
[You crouched beside her and slowly poured the solution into the soil.]
["I'm going away for a few days," you said. "I'll probably be back in three or four days. The essence solution is beside you. I've already mixed in the water."]
[You did not know whether she could understand. But you had grown used to talking to her.]
[Her leaves wound around you as they always did.]
[You gently teased those two gold-patterned leaves with your fingertips, as though playing with a little beast that had only just opened its eyes. She shrank back, then timidly wound around you again with a touch of unrelenting stubbornness.]
[You chuckled softly.]
[Suddenly, a gentle, soft female voice, tinged with weakness and timidity, sounded directly inside your mind.]
["Who... are you?"]
[You froze and looked around, thinking you had imagined it.]
[The voice paused, then sounded in your mind once more.]
["Where... is this?"]
[You realized she had awakened.]
[In an instant, a hundred thoughts flashed through your mind.]
[You had already painstakingly compiled a thick manual for her-the "Blue Silver Emperor Usage Guide."]
[Its contents included, but were not limited to: swallowing and refining her, fusing her with your Martial Soul, refining her soul to control her mind...]
[Several of those methods were ones you had only seen in ancient secret texts and fanfiction from your previous life.]
[According to your research, those methods did not have high success rates. The slightest mistake might destroy Ah Yin outright.]
[But you had not thought much of it.]
[After all, on this entire continent, you were the one who knew her identity best.]
[The hundred-thousand-year Blue Silver Emperor, Tang Hao's wife, and the future Tang Divine King's mother.]
[Behind her stood a great black rat holding a hammer-Clear Sky Douluo, Tang Hao.]
[Powerful, with an explosive temper.]
[And the Blue Silver Emperor possessed the Blue Silver Domain. It could communicate with all the Blue Silver Grass within a certain range, turning it into her eyes and ears.]
[If she wished, she could even establish an enormous intelligence network in an extremely short time.]
[If she managed to contact Tang Hao and let him know you had taken her from her place of "recuperation" and were raising her in your own courtyard, things probably would not end well for you.]
[Besides, she was your fated one, destined to be entangled with you for your entire life. Perhaps becoming one with you was also a kind of fate.]
[All at once, Ah Yin gave a cold shiver, and her outstretched leaves curled back.]
Su Yi: "..."
Not even a blade of grass was off-limits?
[You pressed down those jumbled thoughts.]
[You adjusted your expression, displaying just the right amount of surprise, and widened your eyes slightly as you looked at that stalk of Blue Silver Grass. In a soft, slightly hesitant voice, you asked, "Was... was that you speaking?"]
[The air fell quiet for a moment.]
[That stalk of Blue Silver Grass cautiously extended a leaf again and touched your fingertip.]
[That gentle female voice sounded in your mind again, a little clearer than before, though still carrying some confusion. "Y-yes... it was me."]
["My name is Ah Yin. Who... are you?"]
["My name is Su Yi," you answered.]
[Ah Yin fell silent for a while, seemingly taking in the name.]
[Then she asked again, "How did I end up here? My cultivation... why do I only have a few thousand years left?"]
[You put on a similarly puzzled expression.]
["Were you very strong before?"]
["I..." Her voice faltered. She seemed about to say something, only to stop abruptly.]
[Seeing that she was unwilling to say more, you did not press her. Instead, you began speaking on your own.]
["I found you in a cave."]
["At the time, someone was trying to kill me, and I accidentally fell into a waterfall. When I woke up, I was inside a stone cave. You were growing on a little mound of earth in its center."]
["I discovered that whenever I got close to you, my cultivation speed increased noticeably. I thought you might have some connection to my Martial Soul."]
["I stayed in the stone cave for several more days, but never saw its owner return. The conditions there were truly terrible and extremely bad for your growth, so I brought you out and have kept you by my side ever since."]
[At this point, you released your Martial Soul-Blue Silver Grass.]
[A stalk of Blue Silver Grass that, compared with her true form, was utterly unremarkable and ordinary, without a single golden marking.]
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